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This is no time for woolly idealism or virtue-signalling. Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent must be renewed if Britain is to maintain its status as one of the world’s pre-eminent nations

Tulip Siddiq, the MP for the London – Hampstead & Kilburn constituency and my local MP, sent an email last week encouraging appealing for her constituents to send their views on the renewal of Trident, which Parliament is debating today.

And fair credit to Tulip Siddiq for doing so, rather than simply voting based on any prior ideological views she may have held on the subject. This was the email she sent:

As you will be aware, on Monday 18th July next week MPs will be voting on the renewal of Britain’s Trident nuclear missiles system.

I am deeply disappointed that the Government has rushed through this measure without the chance for proper debate. We are set to have just a day’s debate in Parliament over a spending commitment that will cost billions of pounds throughout its lifetime, and I would have hoped for the chance for much better scrutiny. We still do not have the wording of the motion which we are expected to vote upon.

Nevertheless, I am duty-bound to vote on this issue, and in just a matter of days I will have a momentous decision to make as your local representative. As with the vote on Syria last year I am keen to hear the views of all local residents – on both sides of the debate – ahead of this important vote.

As residents who have written to me about this in the past will know, I have consistently queried the cost-effectiveness of the Government’s plans and raised testing questions with Ministers about the options for renewal.

Given the pressure on our public services and the bleak economic outlook ahead, I think it is vital that Labour redoubles its efforts to scrutinise every penny of public spending and balance our security needs with our country’s other priorities.

I think that you – local taxpayers in this constituency – are best-placed to advise me on how you feel this money should be spent. Just as I did with Syria late last year, I will take the time to look through every comment I receive on this issue ahead of the vote, and you can expect me to respond comprehensively setting out my position in due course.

And here is my response to Siddiq:

Dear Tulip,

Parliament must vote to authorise the renewal of our nuclear deterrent as a matter of the utmost importance. Contrary to the claims of those who favour unilateral disarmament that Trident is an expensive white elephant which we never use, in fact we use our nuclear deterrent every single day, at great benefit to our nation.

Trident benefits Britain in the following ways:

1. Planting the sure knowledge in the mind of rulers of hostile regimes that a nuclear or otherwise catastrophic attack on Britain will be met with a full nuclear response – a deterrent which served us through the Cold War and which nobody should vote to scrap at a time when we can barely guess what threats we will face in 5-10 years time, let alone the medium to long terms

2. Our nuclear deterrent gives Britain a seat at the geopolitical “top tables” and underpins our seat on the P5 of the UN Security Council. The priority of every government (and every MP) must surely be to ensure that Britain’s voice and influence is projected as powerfully and clearly as possible in the world. Scrapping or downgrading our nuclear deterrent would put our permanent seat on the Security Council at risk, immediately making Britain less relevant in world affairs. This will directly harm our interests because, frankly, being a consequential player in the UN helps Britain in a myriad of tangible and intangible ways touching diplomacy, trade and military alliances.

3. Unilateral disarmament by Britain will do absolutely nothing to prompt a sudden outburst of peace or a change in the attitude of Russia and China, the non-allied nuclear powers. Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping would take unilateral disarmament by the UK, put it in the bank and give nothing in return. CND activists and Green campaigners would effectively be virtue signalling their moral purity while Britain’s security and national interest were jeopardised.

4. Britain’s insatiable public services will swallow any money diverted from Trident and then still ask for more, with little money actually reaching the front lines and no great increase in performance metrics over the long term. One could throw billions of pounds more that the NHS and other public services, and newspaper headlines will still talk about how they are perpetually “in crisis”. In fact, throwing more money at public services only serves to paper over the cracks, delaying the eventual reckoning which we need to have regarding the NHS, pensions and other services. Is it really worth killing our nuclear deterrent, deliberately maiming our stature on the world stage just to feed the public services bureaucracy with the extra 0.2% of government spending which the Trident renewal will cost over its lifetime?

I hope that you will consider these points as you consider your approaching vote, and I look forward to your response.

Interestingly, the Conservative candidate defeated by Tulip Siddiq in the 2015 general election was a wishy-washy, vague Coke Zero Conservative who disagreed with the “bedroom tax” and who wanted to scrap Britain’s nuclear deterrent altogether. Shamelessly adopting these left-wing positions did not help him much.

As a “rising star” of the Labour Party and with one eye doubtless fixed on her future political ambitions it will be interesting to see which way Siddiq decides to vote this evening.

5 thoughts on “Why MPs Must Vote To Renew Trident”

I am interested to know what makes my deeply held & considered views ‘virtue signalling’ in contrast to yours. Presumably your interpretation of international influence and security are not ‘virtues’? Or your articulation of them does not constitute ‘signalling’?

My opposition to the UK’s nuclear deterrent is not made on grounds of where the money should be better spent, but on the nature of the thing itself. In the statement issued by Parliament, after the vote to renew Trident, the government reaffirmed its commitment to multilateral disarmament. Now *that* is virtue signaling – saying that we want a bad situation to end, while taking absolutely no steps towards ending it and, ultimately, voting to perpetuate the situation. Nuclear deterrents may have served us well through the Cold War, but I am yet to be convinced by arguments that a deterrent which could only legally be used if the very existence of our state was threatened is in fact the best defence against the threats of the C21st. Meanwhile, if we are serious about multilateral disarmament, we should be taking clear and decisive steps towards this end; if we are not, we should drop the pretence.

I don’t think that opposition to nuclear weapons or indeed pacifism are inherently virtue-signalling behaviours. I was referring specifically to the type of behaviour as shown by the SNP benches in the Commons debate last night, where one of their MPs basically asked if Theresa May would happily order the incineration of innocent children and babies and then wildly overacted feigning shock and horror when she replied that as prime minister, of course she reserves the right to use the UK’s nuclear deterrent if nuclear weapons have been used against us. To say anything else (as Corbyn did) would be to immediately render our deterrent nonexistent, yet SNP MP after SNP MP stood up and acted like it was a case of Theresa May exterminating entire cities on a whim.

Now THAT is the virtue signalling that I anticipated (and saw) in this debate, and which I have no time for. My comments certainly were not aimed at your considered and deeply held views.

What strikes me about Cameron’s London Conservatives is just how “wet” they are. It struck me back in 2009-11 that Cameron’s electoral strategy seemed geared around trying to win over Guardian readers.